After Everything
by filesfreak4life
Summary: My thoughts on Season 7 and what is going to happen. I'm a total JJ fan, so that's what this will probably end up being. Focuses on Lorelai's tribulations more than anything. Enjoy!


PICKING UP AT THE END OF "Partings"

I slept with Christopher. I am…well… I'm still technically engaged to Luke, but I slept with Chris. It always comes back to Christopher. I can say that it's his fault. I was stressing and he kept going, but the truth is that I wanted it to. I didn't care at the moment who it was, but I wanted the comfort. I just won't tell Chris that it wasn't him that I was thinking of.

"Hey, did you sleep well?" he asks me with a hand draped around me.

"umm… yeah, I slept okay, but I have a feeling a lot of that had to do with the tequila." She says, and then allows a silence to fall over them, giving her time to think through what she's supposed to do in this situation.

Finally, she sits up and turns to him, almost shyly pulling the sheet up to cover herself. "You know that this was only a one time thing right?"

He looks into her eyes, his own filled with confusion.

"Regardless of how mad I might have been last night, I still love him. I don't love you Chris, not in that way."

"You don't want to try?"

She pauses, contemplating exactly how to tell him what she's feeling, "Do you want to always be wondering if I'm picturing him instead of you in the back of my mind? That's what would happen if we tried. I can't do that to you, and I can't go through the motions of being with somebody else when I'm not all there."

He looks down with a sigh, not frustrated, but understanding that what she just said was true. "I shouldn't have let you do this last night…."

"As much as I wish that I could put all the blame on you, I can't. We might have had a lot to drink, but I remember every moment, and I don't ever remember thinking that we should stop."

"Even when you knew that you'd regret it in the morning?"

She looks up at him with a pained expression, realizing that she basically used him last night, and knowing full well that she was going to regret the repercussions of this evening for a long time. "I've got to go home. Even if he's angry or confused, he's probably worried about me because I didn't come home."

She leaves him in the bed and goes in search of her dress. Pulling it on, she leans against the wall to support her for a moment. _I finally had it… well… I didn't really, but I was so close this time. Maybe I'm really not ready for this… she was right, maybe it wasn't meant to be._

RORY AND LOGAN'S APARTMENT

Walking back into the apartment, she closes the door and leans herself up against it. She knows that it will be okay, and she'll see him, even if it's not for a very long time.

Knowing that her mom would be the only one to fix her right now, she dials the familiar number home.

"_Hello?" _the gruff voice of Luke answers the phone.

"Luke?" she says, her voice still wavering. "Umm…"

"_Rory, what's wrong, are you okay?"_

"I'm… is mom there?"

Not wanting to really go into details about last night, but not being able to avoid it, he tells her that she didn't come home last night after a spat that they had.

"What did you guys fight about?" she asks, wondering if her mom finally got the guts to tell Luke about what she had been feeling.

"_Don't worry about that, now… I'm not your mom, but I'm always the one she comes to when you're not available, so…"_

"Logan just left. I couldn't even go see him off at the airport, and…" she breaks down again.

"_Rory, it'll be okay… Do you love him?"_

"Yes, but love kind of wears thin when there's an ocean between it."

"_No, love doesn't ever wear thin… if you love him and he loves you, then you'll make it through. If it's meant to be then it's meant to be." _He tells her, possibly trying to convince himself more than her.

BACK AT THE GILMORE HOUSE

Lorelai sees his truck as she pulls up to the house, and entering, hears his voice coming from upstairs. She stops outside the door as she hears that he is talking on the phone.

"_Yeah, but how do you know that it's meant to be?"_

"That I can't tell you Rory" Lorelai's ears perk up when she realizes who he is talking to. "You know that you love him, and that should be good for now. Maybe him going away will shed some light on things."

"_I guess it will, you're right."_

"Wow… you're a lot easier to calm down then your mother. She never tells me that I'm right." He says with a small laugh.

Rory lets out a similar giggle, before allowing herself to ask what happened now that she is pretty calm. "_What happened last night Luke?"_

"She didn't talk to you?"

"_No, I haven't heard from her_."

"She asked me to elope because she was tired of waiting… and I…"

"_You don't do well with spontaneity."_

"Yeah."

"_Luke…"_

"What?"

"_She didn't think that it was going to happen…the wedding… you guys getting married…"_

"Why did she not think that? I want to marry her, I've wanted to marry her since the day I met her… well, not literally, but for a long time. She didn't know that?"

"_Not recently. Luke… you just have to talk to her. Tell her that she needs to tell you everything. She's kept a lot in these past few months…just… talk to her."_

"Rory… she knows that I love her, doesn't she?"

"_She did…"_

He sighs over the phone, realizing that maybe he did mess things up with Lorelai. Now he didn't even know where she was.

"_Hey Luke, thanks for… for being mom for me_."

"You're welcome."

"_I can see why she always went to you…bye Luke_."

"Bye, Rory."

He hangs up the phone, and sitting in the bed, with his back facing the door doesn't realize that Lorelai was there.

She waits for a moment, wiping a few tears from her eyes as she watches him, before finally breaking the silence. "Thank you."

He jumps a little, and then turns to face her.

"Thank you for talking to Rory."

"Well, you weren't here, and I…I didn't want her to be upset."

"You know that's why I proposed that night…" she says, after once again realizing the love that he has for her daughter.

"What?"

"That night, when I told you that Rory had dropped out of Yale. You went on a rant that I couldn't believe, and it was all because you were worried about Rory. You're the only person besides me that I can see loves her with everything. You always had, but it came out so blindingly that night that I couldn't believe it." She says, sitting on the bed next to him.

"Where were you? I was worried."

"Luke, for right now, can we not talk about that? Can we forget about last night, and can I talk to you?"

"Lorelai…"

"I can't do this anymore. Luke for the first time in my life, I finally found it! I found the whole package, and it was with you. I wasn't scared…I had no desire to run… I tried on my wedding dress for the fun of it… and then I stopped. I stopped trying it on, I started doubting this perfect plan, and then somewhere in the back of my mind, I thought that if we finally did get married then everything would end up being alright and we would get it."

"Why did you doubt? Why did you all the sudden decide that you and I needed to get married last night?"

"It wasn't all of the sudden Luke, it has been a long time coming. I've been upset for a while now. And as much as I would like to sit here and blame you for this, I can't. I didn't tell you at all what I was feeling. I told you a bit, one time, when we were on the Vineyard, and then it switched back to just how it was."

"But what –"

"It was April and postponing the wedding, and it was you not fully moving in. It was you not spending as much time in the house that was supposed to be ours. You were slowly drifting farther away from me, and you know me. I need to act when something like that happens."

"I thought that you were okay with all of this…"

"Well, I wasn't… I'm surprised that you didn't know this. You've always known me Luke. You know me just about as well as Rory, and better than her in some aspects. But you didn't see it, and that's what made me start doubting all of this. I finally realized that you and I were always the "it" couple. Everyone has always wanted us together, and maybe in the back of our heads we thought that too all those years. Now that we're finally together, maybe we really aren't meant to be."

"I don't-" he stops as she stands up quickly.

Standing up, she turns away from him for a moment, pulling her engagement ring off, and bringing it up to examine it. In the months since he gave it to her, it seems to have lost a bit of its sparkle, or maybe the promise of what it was to bring slowly drifting away, caused it to lose some of its beauty.

Finally, she turns back to him, a few small tears gliding down her cheeks. "Luke, I don't want to do this. We need time. We need time to figure out what's going on, and if this is meant to be." She hands the ring to him, and he looks up at her, shocked.

"I'm not mad Luke, I just realize that we aren't ready for this. You need time to figure out everything with April and Anna, and how they fit into your life. Maybe a week into this we'll come to our senses or you'll fall in love with another caffeine addicted brunette, but we need time."

"Lorelai, I don't need time. I'm willing to do this… let's go get married. We'll go pick up Rory, and we'll go right now."

"No. Luke, if we did that, then we would regret it. Everything that was said here today would have gone unsaid if we had gone with that plan, and I would still be unhappy. I don't want to marry you… not now."

"Not ever is what you are telling me then."

"No, it's… what did you just tell Rory?"

"That if you love each other you'll make it through."

"And what's meant to be is meant to be."

They stay there for a while, Lorelai's gaze fixed on him. As he goes back and forth between looking up at her and down at the ring, he realizes that she never answered his question. Standing up to leave, he makes it to the door before turning to her again. "Where did you go?"

She takes a large breath it, knowing that this would change everything that just happened, "I went to see Christopher."

Though he is angry, it is a dull anger, and he looks at her once with more pain in his eyes than before and an expression almost resembling guilt.

Right as he steps out of the bedroom, she hears a low muttered "I'm sorry…"

It isn't until she hears the door shut downstairs that she allows herself to realize what she just did.

I gave him the ring back. I broke off another engagement. I broke up with Luke. I told him that I was with Christopher last night. I can't believe that I just let myself do this.

After sitting for a while, letting herself digest everything, she becomes aware of a faint buzzing coming from her night table. Realizing that it's her cell phone, and probably Rory, she retrieves the vibrating contraption from her purse.

"Hello?"

"_Mom? Where have you been?"_

"Well, I'm home now, but I heard that you learned of mine and Luke's little spat last night."

"_He didn't really tell me anything about what happened…what did happen?"_

"Well, do you want me to tell you what happened last night, or do you want me to fast forward to this morning and the conclusion?" she says, her emotions betraying her in the end.

"_Give me the conclusion first and then fill me in later."_

"We're done… at least for now… I gave him the ring back this morning."

"_But why?"_

"He doesn't want to get married… or he's not ready to get married. He really does need time."

"_Did you hear our whole conversation? He wants to marry you…"_

"He doesn't after what happened last night…"

"_Did you finally tell him everything?"_

"Well, not exactly. I certainly told him that I was tired of waiting…"

"The eloping."

"The eloping suggestion came out as more of an ultimatum, which apparently Luke doesn't do well with."

"But, he still loves you, Mom. He told me that today. You guys can work everything—" 

"Rory…there is more." She tells her, with a slight hesitation at bringing up her bad choices.

"What?" 

"After… after he didn't answer anything, I left. I knew that you were going to be with Logan, and I have already hidden out by Sookie once this week. I went to go see your dad."

"I can under—" 

"Rory, I woke up there this morning…"

"Oh."

"It wasn't something that is ever going to happen again, even if I'm not with Luke. I was hurting, and I already told your dad that I had no desire to try that road again. I don't love him…not like I love Luke. I'm pretty sure that I made that clear to him."

"If you still love Luke, then why are you breaking it off?"

"I want to give him the space that he needs. If the two of us are supposed to be together, then that is how it is going to work in the end."

"But what about you? What are you going to do? You just gave him time… you broke off a year long engagement to a man that is perfect for you, and you're acting like it was a long time coming, and the right thing to do…"

"Rory, it was the right thing to do. He does need time. He's not ready for this, and maybe I've been lying to myself. Maybe I'm not ready for this either. Maybe we were as meant to be as everyone has always thought that we were."

"I…I have to go. Maybe I'll come home today and stay for the weekend, but right now I need to go… I need to digest this."

"Hon, there is nothing to digest. What's done is done, and that's all that I have to say about that. You have your own life to be worried about without worrying about your mother's."

"_I'll talk to you later." _Rory says, hanging up the phone.

RORY AND LOGAN'S APARTMENT

After hanging up the phone, she finds herself staring at it, acting as if it had grown arms or something. She didn't get it. She didn't understand why her mom was throwing this out. Maybe she was just running again, and using Luke needing time as an excuse for being scared. She needed to get home, she needed to see Luke.

LUKE'S DINER

The bells rang as she entered, and the confused look came over her face as she saw that there was no one in the diner.

"If you want food go somewhere else, I don't feel like dealing with you right now." She hears him call from the stock room.

"What if I don't want food?" she says, trying to get him out.

"Rory?" he asks, peeking his head from the inside of the room. "What are you…"

"I came to talk to you about mom."

"Rory, this isn't something that you need to worry about."

"Luke, you guys—"

"It was different. The break-up, her giving me the ring back, the way she did it. It was different. I know that she still loves me, and I know that she needs time."

"Well, she's saying that it's you that needs the time… is that true?"

"Now it is…yes." He says, walking up to the door and locking it shut, not caring that it was the middle of the day.

"She regrets it… not telling you everything, but the other thing. She told him that it wasn't going to happen again, and that she wouldn't ever want to try it again, because she would always be in love with you."

"You know… the sad thing is that I'm angry, but I don't blame her for doing it. I drove her to it, and if I would have been paying attention all these months then she wouldn't have had to deliver the ultimatum."

"Luke, you are both to blame for all of this. Mom should have told you about what was going through her head all this time."

"How long, Rory?"

"Since she found out about April. She didn't understand why you would have kept it from her, and then when she knew, why you didn't want her to be a part of it."

He puts his face in his hands, rubbing the tiredness brought on from waiting up for her all night. "Rory, I love you, and I love your mom. Once I get all of this in order, I have no doubt in my mind that I will go to her."

"Then I don't understand why you can't go to her now…"

He looked up at her then, letting his face show the emotion rather than expressing it in words. He was hurting and he knew that going to Lorelai now would make things a lot worse than they already are.

Rory just stood there shaking her head. "Both of you…you're both idiots," she finally says, walking out of the diner, leaving Luke leaning up against the counter with a dazed expression on his face.

THE GIRLS' HOUSE

After driving all the way to Stars Hallow, she knew that the next logical place to go was home. She didn't want to face her mother, but the comfort of those surroundings would take her mind off of other things that were going through her head from earlier in the day.

Some hours later when Lorelai comes down the stairs, she notices the familiar silver car in the driveway, and walks over to her daughter's open door.

"When did you get here?"

Rory, staring at the ceiling in her room doesn't meet her mother's eye. "A few hours ago."

"Thanks for the hello mom."

"Sorry."

"Do you want to talk about Logan? I know that you're upset about him leaving, but Luke was right. If it's meant to be then it'll be. You have to believe that Rory."

"Yeah, that's what Luke keeps saying doesn't he. Just let it be and we'll see what happens." She pauses, waiting for her mother to remark on what was a sarcastic tone of voice. Met with a speechless Lorelai, she tells her mother what's wrong. "I'm not upset about Logan. Well… I am, but there are other things happening right now that are taking up a lot more of my concern."

"Rory, I don't want to get into this with you tonight. I don't want to get into this with you ever."

Sitting up and finally meeting her mother's eye, "Mom, I am not sixteen anymore. This isn't Max, and love isn't the issue. You love him, you both screwed up. Why are you bailing! Why are you bailing when you are finally in a relationship that could probably survive anything! You guys were friends for YEARS before you ever realized that you wanted to be with each other. You loved him as a friend LONG before you realized that you were IN love with him. If the two of you can get through eight years of a really amazing friendship, I am more sure than anything that you can get through this."

"It isn't a matter of getting through something Rory. Luke isn't ready for this yet, and I need to give him time. This is different than before. This is different than the first time that we broke up. This is different than Max. I'm okay with this Rory. I'm not letting myself crumble, because part of me knows that Luke is it and we'll both find each other again."

"So, how is this going to work then? Are you gonna waltz into Luke's tomorrow demanding coffee and flirt with him like the last two years never happened? I can't see that happening, mom…"

"It's complicated….but it's going to be fine."

As her mother got up, Rory could see her wipe her eyes after walking away. It was affecting her, but she was right. It was different.

Okay, well... this is going to be a fic about what I think is going to happen as far as Lorelai goes with Season 7. I'm not going to do anything spoiler based, so you don't have to worry about that. JJ fans might be mad at me, but don't lose heart, because I am a JavaJunkie, so you know what will end up in the end... maybe... kind of... well... I haven't really decided what is going to happen. So, anyways, I hope that you enjoy it, and yeah... Read and Review!


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